Three years on, India remembers 26/11 victims

Mumbai, Nov 26 (IANS) Three years after Pakistani terrorists created mayhem in India’s financial capital killing 166 people, permanently scarring the lives of many more and creating an unsettling fear in the hearts of people, India Saturday paid homage to the victims and martyrs of the audacious crime.

Maharashtra Governor K. Sankaranarayanan laid a wreath at the 26/11 memorial at the Police Gymkhana on Marine Drive in south Mumbai. He was followed by Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, Home Minister R.R. Patil, top police and civil officials.

Cricketers Sachin Tendulkar and M.S. Dhoni, who are staying in the Hotel Taj Mahal, one of the sites targeted by 10 Pakistani terrorists, also paid homage to the victims at a solemn ceremony at the hotel in the morning.

The family members of many of the policemen who were martyred while battling the terrorists also laid wreaths at the 26/11 memorial at the Police Gymkhana.

Thousands of commuters on the Central Railway paused briefly at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST), one of the attack sites targeted in 2008.

Some kept flowers in memory of the commuters killed by the terrorists, who sneaked into the city unhindered through the Arabian Sea and created mayhem.

Similar homage functions were held at the Hotel Taj Mahal, Hotel Trident, Nariman House, Cama Hospital and at Chowpatty - the last being the venue where policeman Tukaram Ombale managed to catch one of the terrorists - Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab - alive.

Ombale was killed in the process.

The terror attacks left 166 dead, including several security personnel and foreigners besides leaving over 300 injured.

Mumbai Police organised blood donation camps at 26 locations around the city as a homage to the 26/11 victims.

The Swabhiman Sanghatana, led by Congress youth leader Nitesh Rane has organised a daylong job fair at Agripada in south Mumbai to give employment to 4,000 people, including the families of policemen and other victims.

The Bombay Hospital is conducting a seminar on ‘Trauma Management’ in which top medicos and police personnel would take part. It was one of the private hospitals where many victims of 26/11 were treated.